“Yeah, Jack. I do,” Prosper told him.
“And why’s that?” Jack asked casually between chews.
“If you don’t know the answer to that then you’re not as smart a man as I thought you were.”
At that, Jack put his hamburger down, pushed his plate away, and wiped his hands on a napkin. He waited a long moment before he spoke, “Brother, I’m a hell of a lot smarter than you might think.” Jack leaned forward then; his biceps flexed while his body stiffened with tension. “I’m smart enough to know that no matter how you feel or how you think you feel about my pregnant wife, the man you are and the brotherhood we share will stop you from crossing that line.” He paused a moment to wait for those words to settle, then he continued, “We’ve had each other’s back while we sat waiting out our time in that decrepit fucking jail house. Then, the time you and I spent together on the road? Best days of my miserable life. You’ve got to know, brother, that there’s no one I trust to have my back more than you, and I’d like to think you feel the same. It’d be a goddamn shame if you’d let a woman, even one as good as Maggie, change that.” Jack leaned back in the booth, then he crossed his arms and waited.
Both men remained quiet for a few moments, allowing the weight of those words to settle hard between them.
“You’re my brother, man. No other way to look at it and no other way to say it. I consider you my blood, that’s for sure,” Prosper told him.
“Glad to hear it, my man.” Jack nodded, then he added, “Is there a but in there somewhere?”
“You give her what she needs? What that kid she’s carrying needs? I’m one hundred … one thousand percent behind that. But I’m here to tell you, brother, you drop that ball? I can’t promise that I ain’t gonna step right up and step right in,” Prosper replied honestly.
Jack thought about that for a moment, then shrugged in that casual, careful way of his.
“Then it’s all good, man. ’Cause I ain’t planning to drop the ball. I ain’t working ninety fucking hours a week and spending my weekends putting together baby shit only to screw it all up later on down the line.”
“Glad to hear it, brother. And I wish you the best, Jack. I want nothing less than that for you and for Maggie. But I’m still leaving,” Prosper said with finality.
“Prosper, it doesn’t have to go down like this,” Jack insisted.
“Ain’t no other way for it to go down,” Prosper shot back. Then he added, “Weather’s gonna turn midweek. I’d like to get out of here before that happens, so I’m good to go tomorrow morning.”
Jack knew when he had been beat. "You riding along the coast?”
“That’s the plan. Maybe head down to Mexico.” Prosper shrugged. “We’ll see how it goes.”
“That’s a damn good ride. One of my favorites,” Jack said wistfully. Then he frowned. “You ain’t gonna be a stranger though, right? You gonna call? Come back and meet the kid?”
“Yeah, of course I will,” Prosper said it like he meant it.
“Glad to hear it.” Jack looked relieved. They both sat on a little longer in companionable silence. “Well, there’s only one thing to do now,” Jack said.
“Yeah, what’s that?”
“You or me. We gotta decide which one of us is gonna tell Maggie that you’re leaving.”
Magaskawee got up from the kitchen table when she heard that telltale creak of the staircase. Then she walked over to the coffee pot and poured out a fresh cup of steaming hot coffee. When Prosper hesitated in the archway of the door, she could see the surprise written on his face. “Did you really expect me to just let you leave without so much as a goodbye?” She put the coffee down on the table. “Black with two sugars. I made it strong too. Just how you like it. There’s a bag full of ham and cheese sandwiches, a few green apples, a couple of bananas, four water bottles, and what was left of the brownies I made on Tuesday …” Her voice trailed off as she looked across the table accusingly at him.
Prosper took a sip of the hot coffee and nodded. “Thanks.”
“Yeah. Well, you’re welcome,” she said through a tight jaw. “I can’t believe this, Prosper. I can’t believe you’re leaving us.” Then she added through teary eyes, “I can’t believe you’re leaving me.”
“I’m not leaving you, Maggie,” Prosper said gently. “I’m just going somewhere else.”
“Is there a difference?” She sniffled.
“Yeah, honey. There’s a big difference.” Prosper longed to touch her, take her in his arms and comfort her. He wanted to throw his duffle bag and his plans to leave out the goddamn window, sweep her into his arms, and make love to her all day long.
Which is exactly why he had to go.
“Well, if I’m gonna beat that rain, I better get going.” When Prosper stood up, Maggie did too. She stood between him and the door. Then Maggie reached out and placed the palm of her hand on his chest, over the place where his heart was beating … and breaking. With her other hand, Maggie took one of his hands in hers, opened his palm, and slipped a small folded square of paper in it. Then she reached up, put her arms around his neck, and kissed him on the cheek.
“Come back to us, Prosper,” she whispered against his ear. Then she pulled away from him and walked out of the kitchen and down the hall to the bedroom where her husband lay sleeping.
Prosper rode fast and hard that morning. He didn’t trust himself to stop until he had crossed three state lines … until he had put enough distance between himself and Maggie so that going back wasn’t an option.
When Prosper finally pulled over, it was at a rest area with a panoramic view of the sea coast. He grabbed the bag of sandwiches out of his saddlebag, then he sat down on a large stone close to the edge of the bluff and enjoyed the view of the rocky shore.
Prosper took his time and ate two sandwiches, an apple, and a brownie, and took long sips of the bottled water. Then he stretched out on the sun-warmed piece of granite and opened the folded note that Maggie had put in his hand. It was only a single line, but one he recognized from a poetry book that he had bought for her from a used book sale that the library had sponsored.
The library.
Just one of the many places that he wouldn’t have been caught dead in if she hadn’t dragged him along. But now, he smiled at the memory. While Maggie had roamed through those tables of musty books, he had thumbed through a few of them just to alleviate the boredom. It seemed that this guy, e. e. cummings, wrote pretty good stuff and didn’t seem to give a shit about capital letters. That was something Prosper, who had never finished high school, could get behind.
Prosper stared at the note for a long while. Then he crumpled up the paper and threw it as far as he could. He watched as a breeze took it and playfully bounced it around in no particular direction, like a kite without a string.
“I carry your heart in my heart too, Maggie,” Prosper whispered into the wind.
And then he got on his Harley and rode as hard as he could away from her.
Maggie sat on the porch swing with a blanket wrapped around her and the child who had fallen asleep in her lap. Raine was a beautiful little girl. With her mother’s smooth ebony hair and her father’s striking blue eyes, the child was a perfect combination of both. Maggie loved her baby girl fiercely, wholly, and without reservation. Nothing made Maggie happier than to see Raine smile.
Life was good, for the most part.
She just wished Jack was a bit more …? Maggie sighed because she was really at a loss when she thought about her husband. Her feelings for him were as conflicted and complex as the man himself.
She had taken a gamble on Jack when he had offered her a chance at a better life. He had convinced her that he was one of the good guys. And in his own way, Maggie supposed that he was. To be fair, Jack was still Jack; it was Maggie who had changed. Somehow, despite the demands of providing for a home and a family, Jack had still managed to maintain his Peter Pan way of looking at life. And Maggie realized it was exactly that ki
nd of whimsy that had drawn her to Jack in the first place: the big dreams, the wandering minstrel, the child within the man.
Well, that’s one way to look at it, Maggie thought wryly. Another way might be juvenile, reckless, and alarmingly unreliable.
Together they had made Raine, so Maggie would never say that taking a chance on Jack was a gamble that she had lost. But she was pretty sure that what they had together wouldn’t qualify as a big win either.
After proclaiming that he needed some road time, Jack had gone on an extended vacation, leaving Maggie and Raine alone to fend for themselves.
Again.
No real surprise there. And the irony of it all did not escape Maggie either. No matter what her resolutions had been and her mindful determination to the contrary, Magaskawee had married a man just like her father. At first, that realization horrified her. But after the epiphany sat with her for a while, Maggie realized that that wasn’t completely true. Jack wasn’t a drunk like her father had been, and he’d also stay at home for months at a time, working at odd jobs and providing for his family until the next time the road called his name.
In all honesty, Maggie had begun to mind Jack’s absences less and less. She still had the money that Tanka had given her hidden away, so she knew that no matter what happened, she and the baby would be okay. For the time being, Maggie had everything she needed. She had a roof over her head, good, rich soil beneath her feet, and the open sky above her. Her garden yielded gorgeous vegetables, and just beyond the fence line was a berry patch and a cool, clear creek that pooled into a small, rock-lined basin. On hot days, she would take Raine down there to play in the water and feed her plump red strawberries.
Magaskawee Whitefeather had come a long way from the Badlands, and she would always love Jack for giving her that—even when he disappointed her.
Maggie had just finished putting Raine in for a nap when she heard the distant roar of Jack’s Harley thundering down the long country road that led to the house. Her stomach knotted with apprehension since he had only left two days ago. For Jack to come home this soon, there must be something wrong. Maggie stood on the front porch with her hand shading her eyes and watched as the bike flew towards her in a cloud of dust and gravel.
The rider was about a few hundred yards away when Maggie realized it wasn’t Jack after all.
Prosper.
Although they had gotten the odd postcard or phone call once in a while, Prosper had not been back to see them since the morning he’d left.
The strong and immediate surge of unmitigated joy at seeing him filled Maggie completely. It was all she could do to stop herself from running down the porch steps and racing down the road to greet him. It felt like forever before he stopped the bike a few feet away from her. Then he swung his leg over the seat and stood tall and strong before her. Prosper had a wide grin splitting his handsome face.
Maggie hesitated a minute, then ran to him with slender arms wide open. She placed them around his hard torso and nuzzled her cheek against his muscular chest. And then with only a slight hesitation, Prosper wrapped his arms around Maggie and held her for a long moment, tighter than he had ever done before.
Prosper held Maggie like he never wanted to let her go.
They sat at the kitchen table and caught each other up on all the news in the way that friends do. Maggie talked about her garden and the baby. She told him how Jack had gone on a road trip and how sorry he would be that he had missed Prosper.
Prosper told Maggie about some of the places he had been and gave her a few small presents he had picked up for her along the way. Maggie marveled at the colorful woven scarf from Mexico, the little tin of sugared pecans from Texas, the jar of sweet, thick peach jam from Georgia, and a keychain made of blue quartz from Alabama
Maggie was touched by Prosper’s thoughtfulness and was pleased because the gifts meant that he had been thinking of her.
Just as she had been thinking of him.
“Mamma-mamma-mamma-mamma-mamma-mamma.” The sound came from down the hall and was accompanied by a strange kind of thumping and rattling.
It sounded to Prosper as if a little motor was revving itself up.
“That would be Raine.” Maggie laughed at the expression on Prosper’s face. “Her favorite thing to do when she wakes up is to call me repeatedly while shaking the daylights out of her crib. She hasn’t tried to climb out of it yet, thank goodness, but when she does, I know there will be trouble!” Then Maggie hurried down the hallway to her daughter’s bedroom. It wasn’t long before she emerged with a little girl held tight in her arms. Raine had her head on her mother’s shoulder and her thumb in her own tiny mouth.
She looked at Prosper with bright blue eyes full of curiosity.
Prosper was spellbound the moment he laid eyes on Maggie’s child. With her honey colored skin, patch of thick black hair, and eyelashes so long you could sweep the floor with them, she was a perfect miniature of her beautiful mother. But those bright blue eyes that stared so inquisitively at Prosper? Those eyes were all Jack.
“She’s a beauty, Maggie.” Prosper smiled at the little girl, who had begun to squirm in her mother’s arms.
“Dow!” Raine demanded as she pointed to the floor.
“Down what?” Maggie looked at her child expectantly.
“Dow, pwease!”
The moment Raine hit the floor she made a beeline in Prosper’s direction.
“I can’t believe a little tiny thing with feet that small can actually walk!” Prosper marveled when Raine started teetering towards him.
“She’s still a little unsteady on them.” Maggie smiled when Raine suddenly plopped down on her bottom. The thick padding of her diaper made a soft, swishing sound.
Prosper walked over to the little girl and picked her up. When he held her in his arms, Raine immediately reached out to pull at the silver chain he had around his neck. Then the little girl continued to explore the big man by sticking a finger in his ear and pulling at his nose. When she placed a palm against the scratchy stubble of his cheek and made a face, Prosper laughed out loud.
Maggie took a reluctant Raine out of Prosper’s arms and put her in a playpen where she immediately began playing with books and toys.
“What do you say we take Raine into town and grab some lunch?” Prosper asked Maggie. “Is there a tire store around here at all?”
Maggie frowned in thought. “Yes, I think there is one at the end of the mall at Turners Corner. Do you need a tire for your motorcycle?”
“No. But you need tires for your car. They have zero tread left on them. You can’t be driving around with Raine like that.”
Maggie laughed. “Prosper, you just got here. How did you notice those tires?”
That’s not the question that needs answering, Maggie. The question should be, how the hell did Jack not notice? But instead of voicing his thoughts, Prosper just shrugged.
“Jack’s been meaning to do some work on the car, but he just never got around to it,” Maggie told him. “I have the money budgeted for some new tires, so it would actually be great if maybe we can get that done today. The steel wall is beginning to poke through on that left passenger side, and honestly, I do worry about getting a blowout.” Maggie went over to the cupboard and pulled a jar from one of the shelves. She took out a wad of rolled-up cash and handed it to Prosper. “There’s three hundred and fifty-nine dollars here. You think that will be enough?”
“Well, that’s just insulting. Put your money away, Maggie.” Prosper frowned at her. “I got this.”
“This money is especially for the tires, Prosper. I budgeted it in,” Maggie insisted.
“Well then, you can budget it in somewhere else, Maggie.”
“I’m not comfortable with this.” She crossed her arms in front of her chest.
“Okay, well … that didn’t take long.” He snorted.
“What didn’t take long?”
“For that damn stubborn side of yours to show.”
Prosper couldn’t help but grin. “Okay, fair enough. How about you let me bunk down here for a while? There are some upgrades I want to do on the bike, and I’d like to stick around long enough to see Jack. You can throw a meal my way once in a while and we’ll call it even.” Prosper shrugged.
“Tell you what—” Maggie replied, “You let me pay for lunch today, and I’m in.”
Now it was a few days later, and it amazed Prosper how easy it was to slip back into a familiar rhythm with Maggie. She was as earnest and kind and agreeable as he remembered. She was also amazing with Raine, and it was a beautiful thing to see them together. Being with Maggie brought a kind of peace to Prosper, and if he had been conflicted or confused about his feelings for her before, then being with her again had erased any lingering doubt. The miles and time that had separated them had not changed a damn thing. If anything, it made him realize more than ever that he was deeply, profoundly, and undoubtedly still in love with his best friend’s wife.
And the more time Prosper spent with Maggie, the more pissed off he was getting at Jack. With every day that passed, Prosper thought for sure this would be the day that would bring Jack thundering up the road. Not only was there no sign of him, there was no word from him either. Nothing to let his wife know where he was, when he’d be back, or even if he’d be back. Prosper did his best to hold his tongue, but the more time that’d gone by, the more difficult it became.
“I fixed the hinge on the door while you were putting Raine to bed. Damn thing’s like a guillotine! Liable to cut her little fingers right off.”
“Thank you …” Maggie sighed. “Jack—”
“—is one irresponsible motherfucker,” Prosper said with a disgust he could no longer hide.
“Don’t say that.” Maggie scolded with a frown.
“Why not, Maggie? Why shouldn’t I say it?” he snapped back.
“Because…” Maggie began.
Prosper (Hells Saints MC Book 7) Page 6
